Pages

Monday, June 06, 2016

Elephant Cage Radio and other Interesting Radio Stories on the Island of Guam

Elephant Cage Radio on the island of Guam! There are no elephants on Guam, and no need
for a cage to contain them. Let’s go back to the middle of last
century so that we can find out about the beginning of this strange phenomenon,
Elephant Cage Radio.

During the early part of the
European War in the middle of last century, German radio personnel erected a
huge new antenna system that would enable the reception of long distance
shortwave stations and that would also enable accurate direction finding of
these stations. Under the direction of
Dr. Hans Rindfleisch and with the participation of the German radio
manufacturing company, Telefunken, a large circular array of receiving antennas
was constructed at Skibsby in Denmark.

The outer ring of this circular
antenna system with a diameter of 390 feet was made up of 40 vertical radiator
elements based on true North. An inner
circle of reflectors was suspended on wooden poles, and the electronic
receiving equipment was installed in a specially constructed building at the
center of the circle. This new and
unusual radio receiving antenna system was given the code name Wullenwever.

After the end of the European war, British
radio personnel studied this Skibsby radio receiving antenna system and then
had it demolished. However, soon
afterwards, Telefunken constructed a new Wullenwever antenna system in Germany
itself at Langenargen/Bodensee. Soon
afterwards, the Americans disassembled this new Wullenwever antenna system,
transported it to the United States, and re-erected it in Illinois.

Then a similar though considerably
larger station was constructed near Bondville, a little to the south east of
Champaign in Illinois. This new American
station with a diameter of 1,000 feet consisted of 120 wide band vertical
monopoles that could tune shortwave signals from 2 MHz right up to 20 MHz. Even though this station was long ago dismantled,
the extended circle can still be seen quite readily on Google Earth.

A large number of these circular
antenna systems, now known under the adjusted name of Wullenweber, have been
constructed by many different major countries around the globe. The cost for each installation can be as high
as $20 million, and the largest seems to be a German facility with a diameter
of 1350 feet.

Over a period of time, the United
States has installed a score of these stations in North America, as well as in
Europe, Asia and the Pacific. Russia
installed 30 of these Krug antennas as they were known in their language,
Canada had two, and Japan a couple also.
At Sugar Grove in West Virginia there were two of these Wullenweber
antenna stations side by side; they became operational in 1969 for maritime
communication, though they were demolished thirty or more years later.

The total number of these massive
electronic structures throughout the world is thought to have been around one
hundred; and somewhere less than a dozen are still active. The satellite era finally brought an end to
the half century Wullenweber era.

On the island of Guam, the American
Wullenweber receiving station was located towards the north of the island. The empty and abandoned circle can be seen on
Google Earth at the end of Howth Street; though on Google Maps, you can see the
station at the time when all of its equipment was still standing.

Originally, the Germans named this
massive antenna system, Wullenwever; the Americans changed the name to
Wullenweber, though officially they were known as Circularly Disposed Dipole Arrays
(CDDAs); the Russians called them Krug; though most people knew them
colloquially as Elephant Cages, due to their massive size.

While we are still on the island of
Guam, we are reminded that back during the two year period in 1945 and 1946,
the naval radio station NPN, under the tactical callsign KU5Q, often carried
the relay of radio program inserts that were fed into the mediumwave networks
in the United States. These program
relays consisted of news reports, news commentaries, feature programs and local
music that were received from China, Japan and the Philippines and they were
relayed onward to Honolulu and California.
On many occasions, these program inserts were spliced into the worldwide
English language broadcasts from the Voice of America.

In addition, during the Operation
Crossroads atomic tests in the Bikini Islands in the same era, station NPN-KU5Q
operated as a co-ordinating point for program relays to the Voice of America in
California.

Somewhere around the year 1980, the
Voice of America gave consideration to the possibility of erecting additional
relay stations at strategic locations in different parts of the world. One of the possible locations that was
investigated was the island of Guam, though nothing further came from this
initiative.

Then, back some forty years ago, the
mediumwave station KUAM at Agana Guam announced that they planned on installing
a shortwave transmitter that would relay their mediumwave programming
throughout the island and to other islands in the Marianas and beyond. Radio station KUAM was the first fully
licensed commercial mediumwave station on Guam, and it was inaugurated on March
14, 1954.

At 5:55 pm on that same day, Sunday
March 14, the AFRTS station at Nimitz Hill signed off, for what they stated was
the last time. Then 5 minutes later on
this the official opening day, that is at 6:00 pm on that same March 14 (1954)
the new KUAM signed on with 1 kW on 610 kHz as the island’s first regular commercial
broadcasting station.

The AFRS station had been on the air
for nearly 10 years under the consecutive callsigns WXLI WVTG and FEN Guam, and
it was then closed “forever”,
giving way to the new commercial station KUAM.
However, as time went by, this was not at all the end of AFRTS stations
in Guam. Over a period of time, several
new low powered AFRTS stations were subsequently installed on Guam, initially
on mediumwave and later on FM.

In 1975, the WRTVHB listed a new 100
kW shortwave station as a future plan for mediumwave KUAM on Guam. However, this projected station was never
installed on Guam, but instead, the entire shortwave project was transferred to
the nearby island of Saipan, and the station was inaugurated 7 years later
under the callsign KYOI.

More
about the shortwave scene in the Marianas islands in coming editions of
Wavescan(AWR/Wavescan-NWS 379)